Fifty Long Miles

This is one of a number of songs telling of happy seduction, followed by marriage. Versions of it have turned up fairly regularly in England but rarely elsewhere. It is based an old song with the snappy title “John’s Earnest Request; Or, Betty’s Compassionate Love extended to him in a time of distress” From the late 17th century. Other versions are usually entitled “Forty Long Miles” or “It Rains, it Hails.”